Craig Levein has revealed that injured captain Christophe Berra is targeting the home game against Rangers at the start of December as his return from injury – providing he’s picked.

Berra has been unavailable since tearing his hamstring during Hearts’ 1-0 win over Celtic on the second day of the league season.

The skipper hopes to be able to return to action in time for Rangers’ visit to Tynecastle on December the second, and Levein admitted his squad is having to hang in there until their important players start to get fit again.

“Christophe is doing really well, he has pencilled in the Rangers game - he must be picking the team for that game,” joked Levein.

“I don’t know if that’s doable but he seems to be very positive. He has been outside doing a lot of work, running and stuff, and he is definitely improving and there has been a big leap forward.

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“We were told six to eight weeks with Naisy but I’m hoping it’s nearer the six weeks so we can get him back for three or four matches before the break as well. I don’t think John or Uche will be ready before the winter break.

“It will be a boost having Christophe and Naisy back in December if that’s the case, we’ve had a spell of really weird situations of getting serious injuries that are actually happening in matches, which is difficult to deal with.

“Sometimes you can look at your training if they’re training injuries but they’re not - they’re all unusual situations during matches.

“Luckily enough, we’ve not had anything since then. I’m hoping that’s us turned the corner with that exasperating spell of people going out for any length of time with some weird injuries.”

Hearts have suffered thanks to a lack of strikers in recent games. They remain top of the table ahead of Saturday’s home game against Kilmarnock, but are just a point ahead of Celtic after last week’s 5-0 hammering in Glasgow.

Levein however, believes his players are hanging in there and can still maintain sufficient levels in order to win games.

“We played Celtic twice away from home and Hibs at home - difficult at any pereiod - with no strikers,” he reminded.

“Steven Naismith’s absence will be felt in every match but we come into a run of fixtures that are not quite as tough as we faced recently.

“We’ve got Steven MacLean back and Craig Wighton and Sean Clare are getting up to speed so I’m not wondering what the earth I’m going to do.

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“Our first set-back was early in the Betfred Cup and we came back from that and drew a game at Livingston home where we would have been expected to win.

“But this past week we’ve had three massive games in a short space of time and I just felt we were coming to the end of our energy levels.

“It’s good to get that feeling back where they’re looking forward to coming back into work and if their previous reaction to disappointment is anything to go by then I’ll expect them to be top of their game on Saturday”